And Another Down, And Another One Down…

The agony of victory, the thrill of no defeat

Another one bites the dust. The Knicks finally ended their NBA-record playoff losing streak of 13 games last night against their rival, the Miami Heat. Carmelo Anthony and Amare Stoudemire played as well together on the court as they ever have since combining forces midway through last season. The Knicks beat the Heat for the first time in 7 tries this season in front of a sold out Madison Square Garden Crowd. All should be fine and dandy in a Knicks fans mind, except for the fact that once again the injury bug has bitten a Knicks starter.

Baron Davis was taken off the court on a stretcher late in the third quarter of yesterdays victory after suffering a severe knee injury that will most likely remove him from the rest of the post-season. The list of Knicks starters that have now been injured at some point throughout this season is so long it is almost laughable. Outside of Landry Fields, every Knicks player to start at least one game this season has been sidelined with an injury of some sort, whether it was a season ending one like Iman Shumpert’s torn ACL or self-inflicted stupidity as in Amare punching glass in anger. I personally have never seen so many injuries in one season and for the most part, coach Woodson and the Knicks have found ways to work around them and win.

“Linjury or not, I’m Lin it to win!”

This most recent injury to Davis will present a whole new set of challenges that the Knicks will have to face. With Shumpert already out for the remainder of the playoffs, the Knicks are stuck with an aging Mike Bibby and a woeful Toney Douglas to start at PG. That is unless a miracle happens and ‘Linsanity’ rises once again. After enduring a handful of full-contact practices for a few weeks and playing through nonstop rehab drills for a month now, Jeremy Lin might be ready to make his long-awaited comeback. Lin is a player who rose to stardom from obscurity only to get injured and fall back down to reality. He has been sidelined for over a month while the Knicks slowly crumble at the hands of the Heat in the first round of the playoffs. Jeremy seems to be ready to go and with Davis out his return seems more than likely at this point. After Sunday’s victory over the Heat, many of the Knicks players seemed optimistic about Lin playing in Miami Wednesday for game 5 of the series, which the Knicks trail 3-1.

Jeremy’s best friend on the team, Landry Fields had this to say, “”I hope so, (referring to whether or not Lin will be able to play), he seems to be moving really well. I haven’t seen him go through full physical workouts yet, but he looks all right.

“I think he can come back, he’s looked good. It just depends on how confident he is (with the injury),” Steve Novak said.

Amare is handy when it counts

With Amare finally looking determined to be more than an over paid utility player and Lin possibly coming back to start for the Knicks, maybe there is a tiny bit of hope left in the hearts of Knicks fans. I know I will be glued to the front of the TV while the Knicks either play their final game of the season Tuesday night or force a pivotal game 6 back in the Garden.

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2 responses

mr. know-it-all

for you knick fans upset that you’ll be shorthanded for the remainder of the playoffs, cheer up. all that remains is one game. the only reason there’s even that is the heat decided to play it free and easy yesterday, and not put the foot to the pedal in the last 5 min. i truly believe they let up with the idea of bringing the series back to miami to win in front of their fans, and, more critically, bring in an extra game’s worth of revenue. miami knows they can beat the knicks at will. it was just a stay of execution.

I couldn’t believe I when Davis went down, there seems to be a knee injury epidemic going around, I know they aren’t Knicks, but Derrick rose and msrisno Rivera all suffered the same injury a week apart, really weird…glad to see the Knicks win for the fans, expecting it’ll be a wrap Tuesday though would be really interested to see if Lin could play and be productive